Akhilesh Yadav supports Yashwant Sinha, to hold Meet of MLAs, MPs Ahead of Presidential polls

Samajwadi Party leader and former chief minister of Uttar Pradesh Akhilesh Yadav has called a key meeting of his party MPs and MLAs ahead of the Presidential polls scheduled on July 18. The key meeting has been called at Samajwadi Party headquarters in Lucknow. According to sources, the Samajwadi Chief is expected to hold a discussion and a brainstorming session to help garner maximum votes for the opposition's joint Presidential candidate and Yashwant Sinha from UP.

The Samajwadi Party and allies, including SBSP and RLD together have 125 MLAs together while the party has five MPs in Rajya Sabha. There are currently three Samajwadi Party MPs in the Lok Sabha. By-elections are being held on two seats, if the Samajwadi party wins wins, their total MP count in Lok Sabha will reach 5. The voting method/pattern in Presidential polls is slightly different from the rest. The electoral college for the election to the President of India comprises all MPs of the two houses and MLAs of all state assemblies.

The votes of each state's MLAs have a different value computed on the basis of the state's population and number of seats. This pattern makes BJP's staggering majority in the Lok Sabha less significant when it comes to electing the next President of India.UP assembly with 403 seats brings 208 value to each MLA vote. That's why the UP assembly has the heft of 83,824 vote value that, 's 15.25 percent of the state MLAs in the electoral college.. In this way, the value of SP MLAs along with allies is around 26000, in this value of MPs is not included.

The responsibility of Akhilesh Yadav to get Yashwant Sinha to garner more votes from the opposition gets more important as SP and Trinamool Congress share good relations. Yashwant Sinha also has good relations with the SP Chief, and he had also come to the SP headquarters some time back. Cross voting will spell disaster for SP. Therefore, Akhilesh Yadav have heightened his support for Yashwant Sinha. On Tuesday, the BJP-led NDA has declared Droupadi Murmu as its candidate for the post of President. Droupadi if elected, will be the first President for India, hailing from a tribal community. Voting for the presidency will be held on July 18. The term of the current President Ram Nath Kovind is ending on July 24.